Automated materials handling systems (AMH) is technology that reduces or eliminates the need for humans to check-in, check-out, sort material, or to move totes and bins containing library material. AMH are used in smart, or automated warehouses, and include robots, drones, autonomous vehicle and other devices for moving, lifting, pulling, pushing, storing, and retrieving goods and products. At Ryder, we have prioritized four types of AMH most applicable to creating and supporting a smart warehouse: robotics, sensors and automatic identification tools, wearables, and drones. When implemented correctly, these four technologies define the five key attributes that create a smart warehouse: automate as it makes sense economically; remain nimble with space, staff, and software; scale instantaneously in response to needs; provide 100 percent real-time visibility; and use a web-centric approach to run the business and provide a customer-centric experience.

Automated warehouses use technology such as robots, autonomous vehicles, wearables, and drones to complete tasks that would be otherwise completed by a person. Through automation, warehouses can run more efficiently as the time to complete tasks is minimized and people labor is used more effectively. This allows for companies to optimize warehouses and distribution centers and leads to increased order and pick accuracy, improved inventory management, and lowered costs.

Drones have many uses in the smart warehouse including inventory management, facility management and security. Drones are used to travel through facilities to map the warehouse and update data on inventory and facility conditions. Manually, this task could take two or more employees and at least one scissor lift to complete. The drone can be programed by the operator to perform automatic inventory checks throughout the warehouse, accurately identifying inventory in put away locations, at the frequency of your choosing. Moving the process of information capture into the air provides on demand checks and avoids the time, expense, and risk of using a scissor lift to access difficult to reach locations within the warehouse. Additionally, a cycle count on an entire warehouse that took up to two days to complete, can now be completed in less than 2 hours. By using drones, employees are better able to focus on value-added functions, assets are freed up, and tasks can be completed up to 66 percent faster.